Skip to main content

Retreat!



One month ago today, we welcomed two new beauties into our home and family through foster care. Going from a mom of two to the mom of four overnight pretty much rocked my world. There have been lots of changes I expected, but one change that I had not expected was my sudden reluctance to leave home. In all honesty, I became afraid of taking all four kids places with me. The grocery store, restaurants, and even church became places that produced anxiety as I tried to figure out how to manage the bickering, disobedience, requests, and wandering of four little people all at once outside of the safe confines of our home.  

On Sunday, Matt and I decided to take the day off from our regular responsibilities. We had the opportunity to go to Tennessee and celebrate my nephew's decision to follow Christ in baptism, and we took it, even made a full day of it. All six of us worshiped together, celebrated together, and then ventured out to the zoo to have fun together. Admittedly, I was nervous. I was expecting the entire trip to end in a flurry of tears, screaming, and exhaustion. Much to my surprise, our trip back to Alabama was filled with little girl giggles, silliness, and singing, and a new found connectedness as a family.

What happened in just one day that changed our family dynamic, that bonded us in a new way? We retreated. We stepped away from the everyday routine and busyness of life and embraced adventure, fun, and new experiences as a family. Merriam-Webster defines the word "retreat" as "movement by soldiers away from an enemy because the enemy is winning or has won a battle". I didn't realize that the enemy was winning the battle for real, close connections in our home until I stepped away and saw what could be. In October, our family will retreat for two days as part of The Brook's Family Retreat. I am again a little nervous about how we will meet all the needs our family has right now in this unfamiliar setting, but unlike last week, I am now also incredibly excited to experience all the new things together and hear the excited chatter and giggling from four little girls who are learning to be a family. I am excited to talk to them about all the new things they see, hear, or conquer. I am approaching this expecting that God will draw us to Him and each other in a new way as we retreat with expectation and intentionality.     

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

God has Answered

Considering the tremendous gifts God has given me, I feel it is imperative that I quickly share our story with you, in the event that you don't already know it, of course. In March 2007, my husband and I found out we were expecting our first child. We were elated, however on June 1, we lost that baby. We were both devastated, and I had a lot of trouble dealing with that loss. I was depressed and felt tremendous guilt even though I knew there was nothing I could have done. It would take us five months to get pregnant again, and we would only experience a week of joy before we would lose that baby as well. After that loss, I became extremely depressed. I had never experienced darkness like that before. I had become a believer in Christ as a small child, and I had experienced few challenges in my life up until that point. November and December were terrible months that year, filled with tears and pain and loneliness. At the end of December, I finally realized that I had becom...
3 comments
Read more

Too Many Choices

Photo by Mozart Do you remember the show "Clean Sweep"? A team with a goofy construction pro, a dramatic designer, a hard-nosed organizer, and an over-the-top host would enter a family's home and convince them to get rid of the majority of the "junk" in a room with the promise of a new, better room. At first, it was a humorous show with playful banter and a few tears, but as time went on, America began to realize that some of these people had problems, big problems, that could not be solved in two days on site and a 30 minute television show. Fast forward a few years, and now there is a clinically diagnosed anxiety disorder called hoarding and much darker, more serious shows "Hoarders" and "Hoarding: Buried Alive". I have a close family member, who if she consented to psychological help, would no doubt be diagnosed with this disorder. As I considered her history, her life that led to this place where she is completely obsessed and co...
Post a Comment
Read more

Foreigners to Family

When Matt and I were dating, I casually made the comment one evening that if he wanted a big family like his own (he's the oldest of five), then we probably weren't the right match. I have one sister, and at the time, I considered two to be the perfect number of children for any family. Since I knew everything in my twenties, no one would have been able to convince me otherwise. Matt sweetly responded that two kids sounded good to him. Today, as five precious little girls get into my mini-van in the school car line, I wonder what God thought then. Did He laugh at my small dreams or just shake His head at my ignorance?  Fifteen years ago, if you had told us that God would take us on a roller coaster adventure of infertility, ministry, and parenthood that would ultimately lead to a home filled with five little ladies between the ages of five and nine, I don't know if we would have laughed or cried. However, here we sit, a year into our foster parenting adventure the bi...
Post a Comment
Read more